Recently, I came up on an article that brought up something interesting, yet a very widespread belief by some viewers on YouTube. Many people in the writing industry think that by being published means that they are a good writer. I have known otherwise for a while and there are even other blog articles on this, but I will cover it anyway.

Traditional publishing these days is kind of like the cool crowd that everyone envies in high school. All the popular girls, the jocks, etc. that is the basic gist I get from many comments from people that put down self publishing. People think that publishers choose the greater writers and send awesome stories out to the public. Traditional publishing is the equivalent of jocks and cliques.

Now, I will give people credit and say that not every thing under the sun that was self published is great. I have come across many stories that are just dreadful with a lack of imagery and other major issues. The main problem is proofreading and/or editing is not always done. My own stories are not perfect, but I get my work proofread two or three times before ever producing eBooks and formatting them for print, but overall, it is the better path for my needs and style.

If you do not submit to agents, publishers, etc., your work is not that good. This is the statement I hear a lot, but this is not the case. Unfortunately for those that believe this statement, this is incorrect. Traditional publishers, like the major houses, agents, and editors care about only one thing. That is profit, just like any other business. The fact that it made it through the entire process does not mean the story is good, just that it is profitable. This is why you have such horrible books in traditional publishing being released.

By going the traditional route for your so-called validation, you are the guy that goes out of their way to make sure that people witness him doing something good. When they realize that he is utter garbage, he gets angry. The reason is that people like authors think they create diamonds. Their writing is like their baby. If one disses the author’s writing, they are essentially dissing the author. After all, writers and artists share one thing in common, neither one hide their emotions from their work.

In retrospect, authors seek validation because they want to feel good their, but they fail to realize is that they must enjoy it themselves. This is due to the fact that neither a writer nor an artist can hide their emotions from their work. People can seek validation from traditional publishing, but all mainstream publishing is is a business. Like any other business, they only care about profit, not quality.

What are your opinions on this subject? Feel free to comment.

If you want to read some more on this subject, look at the following articles/blog posts: